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Arpien
My first new conlang in 48 years! No phonology yet, so of course no vocabulary yet. It has 22 "open" word-classes and 80 "closed" word-classes. The words "open" and "closed" are in quotes, because the real difference is that wherever an "open" word-class can be used, certain phrases can also be used there and be equally grammatical; but where a word from a "closed" class can be used, only another word from the same class can be substituted for it and still have a grammatical utterance. It's completely isolating, and so it has no "morphology". Its syntax can be written in Chomsky normal form. It is entirely head-final. Every phrase consists of two parts; the complement and the head. The head determines both the word-class that the complement has to come from, and the word-class that the entire phrase can be substituted for. OTOH if you know both the word-class of the complement and the word-class whose distribution the entire phrase's distribution matches, then you know the word-class the head must be from. It is neither right-branching nor left-branching, since, when the head happens to come from one of the 22 "open" word-classes, it could be phrasal, even if the complement isn't phrasal. OTOH the head might be a single word (and, if it comes from one of the 80 "closed" classes, actually uimust/i/u be a single word), but the complement might be a phrase. In either case the head would still have to come after the complement. I will publish a list of the word-classes, and the CFG grammar, when I get around to it, which I hope will be soon (but who knows?). The purpose of this conlang is just to see whether or not I can actually make a conlang according to this formalism. The capital letters are nonterminal symbols; they can be replaced by another non-terminal or by a string of non-terminals. The lowercase letters and numerics are "quasiterminal" or "metaterminal" symbols; they can be replaced by single words of the appropriate class, which are the terminal symbols. The lowercase letters represent "open" word-classes, and the numerics represent "closed" word-classes. "A" represents sentences and/or clauses. "B" represents nouns and noun-phrases and phrases which can be used as if they were nouns. A --> a | A C | B D | C G | D H | E I | F J | G 17 | H 18 | I 19 | J 20 | K 21 | L 22 | M 23 | N 24 | O 25 | P 26 | Q 27 | R 28 | S 29 | T 30 | U 31 | V 32 B --> b | A E | B F | C K | D L | E M | F N | G 33 | H 34 | I 35 | J 36 | K 37 | L 38 | M 39 | N 40 | O 41 | P 42 | Q 43 | R 44 | S 45 | T 46 | U 47 | V 48 C --> c | A O | B P | C 1 | D 2 | E 3 | F 4 D --> d | A Q | B R | C 5 | D 6 | E 7 | F 8 E --> e | A S | B T | C 9 | D 10 | E 11 | F 12 F --> f | A U | B V | C 13 | D 14 | E 15 | F 16 G --> g | A 49 | B 50 H --> h | A 51 | B 52 I --> i | A 53 | B 54 J --> j | A 55 | B 56 K --> k | A 57 | B 58 L --> l | A 59 | B 60 M --> m | A 61 | B 62 N --> n | A 63 | B 64 O --> o | A 65 | B 66 P --> p | A 67 | B 68 Q --> q | A 69 | B 70 R --> r | A 71 | B 72 S --> s | A 73 | B 74 T --> t | A 75 | B 76 U --> u | A 77 | B 78 V --> v | A 79 | B 80 I haven't decided on the exact correspondence between the usual terms for word-classes and the terms I'll use when talking about Arpien. But here's my first, partial, approximation. A Sentence or Clause B Noun or Noun Phrase C Auxiliary or Sentential Adverb D Monovalent Verb or Verb Phrase (including most intransitive verbs) E Complementizer or Phrasal Complementizer F Adjective or Adjective Phrase G Makes a Clause out of an Auxiliary or Sentential Adverb H Makes a Clause out of a Monovalent Verb I Makes a Clause out of a Complementizer J Makes a Clause out of an Adjective K Makes a Nominal Phrase out of an Auxiliary or Sentential Adverb L Infinitivizer; Makes a Noun out of a Monovalent Verb M Makes a Noun out of a Complementizer N Makes a Noun out of an Adjective O Conjunction for Clauses, or, Subordinator for Adjunct Clauses (resulting phrase modifies a sentence or clause) P Bivalent Verb Taking a Noun and a Complement Clause; or Postposition (resulting phrase acts as an auxiliary or as a sentential adverb) Q Subordinator for Adjunct Clauses (resulting phrase modifies a monovalent verb or verb phrase) R Bivalent Verb or Verb Phrase (including most monotransitive verbs) S Makes a clause into a complementizer T Postposition Resulting in Phrasal Complementizer U Relativizer V Postposition Resulting in Phrasal Adjective; e,g, Genitive Postposition; or, Conjunction for Nouns 1 Adverb that Modifies an Auxiliary or Sentential Adverb 2 Makes an Auxiliary or Sentential Adverb out of a Monovalent Verb 3 Makes an Auxiliary or Sentential Adverb out of a Complementizer 4 Makes a Complementizer out of an Adjective 5 Makes a Subordinator out of an Auxiliary or Sentential Adverb 6 Adverb that Modifies a Monovalent Verb 7 Makes a Monovalent Verb out of a Complementizer 8 Makes a Monovalent Verb out of an Adjective 9 Makes a Complementizer out of an Auxiliary or Sentential Adverb 10 Makes a Complementizer out of a Monovalent Verb 11 Adverb that Modifies a Complementizer 12 Makes a Complementizer out of an Adjective 13 Makes a Phrasal Adjective out of an Auxiliary or Sentential Adverb 14 Participlizer; Makes an Adjective of a Monovalent Verb 15 Makes an Adjective out of a Complementizer 16 Adverb that Modifies an Adjective 67 Trivalent Verb Requiring a Noun and Two Complement Clauses 68 Trivalent Verb Requiring Two Nouns and a Complement Clause 69 Trivalent Verb Requiring a Noun and Two Complement Clauses 70 Trivalent Verb Requiring Two Nouns and a Complement Clause 71 Trivalent Verb Requiring Two Nouns and a Complement Clause 72 Trivalent Verb (Including Most Ditransitive Verbs) Category:FFD